Crown Base (Ship)
Description During the first Unhuman War, the Imperial Elven Navy developed a new, more maneuverable and more powerful version of their ubiquitous Man-o-War, making all of their older Men-o-War (now referred to as Archaic Men-o-War) obsolete. During wartime, the elves needed all of the warships that they could grow, and so the Archaic Men-o-War continued to serve alongside their modern cousins. Once the power of the goblinkin was broken, and the great hunt to wipe out their fleeing ships was largely complete, the IEN began looking at removing the surviving Archaic Men-o-War from active service. The IEN had discovered during the war that the asteroid bases that they were acustomed to using as fleet command centres were inadequate in many ways. Since the war had spread across such a vast area of space, and since the hottest, most desperate fighting tended to move from sphere to sphere rather than remaining in one place, the elves realized that they would have been much better served by bases which would primarily remain stationary, but which could be moved from one sphere to another if needed. In practice, this had led to the increased importance of Armadas as command ships, and a decrease in the importance of command bases, with those bases serving more as supply depots than anything else. While for many situations, an Armada was an adequate command vessel, in other situations a larger command base was needed. The retirement of the Archaic Men-o-War proved to be the solution to the elven need for semi-mobile command bases. These Men-o-War were piloted to locations where bases were needed, along with pre-fabricated citadel components. Once they had arrived at the base location, the Men-o-War were joined at the wings into a ring formation, with the ships' "heads" and all weapons facing outwards, while the citadel components were assembled in the centre of the arrangement. The resulting base design was dubbed a Crown Base due to its resemblance to an enormous crown. If needed, a Crown Base can be disassembled into its component Archaic Men-o-War and citadel components, and transported via the helms of the Men-o-War to another location, however it is highly uncommon for a Crown Base to be moved more than once every few decades. Each Man-o-War in a Crown Base will retain a helm in case the base needs to move. If a move is needed, it will usually take about a week to disassemble the base and prepare for transport. While in theory, each Archaic Man-o-War will tow 15 tons of citadel components during a move, typically most of the Archaic Men-o-War will only be equipped with minor helms, and will thus be unable to do so. Instead, all of the citadel components will be moved by 2-3 of the ships, which will be equipped with major helms for just this purpose. Crew A Crown Base is usually stationary, and so there is no need for sailors to maneuver it, except when disassembled into Archaic Men-o-War. On average, the permament staff of such a base will be approximately 300 elves, with many transient personnel as naval vessels dock and depart. The permanent staff will include approximately 200 weaponeers, marines, and flitter pilots, with the remainder of the staff made up of command and support elements. A Crown Base is always commanded by an admiral, and it will have a command structure as strict as that found on any Armada in the Imperial Elven Navy. The hurly-burly of visiting ships s kept tightly under control by the base staff, who are strict about what personnel from docking ships are allowed to board, and what areas those personnel are allowed to access. Ship Uses Semi-Mobile Base: Crown Bases serve the Imperial Elven Navy as semi-mobile bases which can be deployed to trouble spots or evacuated from dangerous areas as needed. Most Crown Bases serve in a command role, and will be the base from which the navy of a given sphere is coordinated. Perhaps half of elven sphere navies are commanded from such bases, while the rest are either not large enough, or not strategically important enough to warrant the deployment of a Crown Base. In some cases Crown Bases are deployed for reasons other than command, but this is rare. Other base functions include defense, interdiction, supply, and recreation (this last function is extremely rare, with only one known example). The layout of a Crown Base's weaponry makes it dangerous to attack from the top or any side, however its underbelly is vulnerable. In most cases the Crown Base will be deployed in a manner intended to minimize the risk of attack from that direction, however the IEN is not foolish enough to rely on this as protection. Instead, a Crown Base will typically be assigned 40-100 Flitters to provide close defense, and 1-6 Cutters to provide mid-range defense. Since other naval vessels will often be in the area as well, this is considered to be adequate defense. In at least one case, however, the vulnerability of Crown Bases to attack from beneath was brutally exposed. During the second Unhuman War, a scro battle fleet used diversionary attacks to draw away the defending craft of the Crown of Corellon. The scro followed up with a boarding action undertaken by ships approaching from below the Crown Base, and managed to capture the station for their own use. Other Configurations Alternate Sizes: The statistics given here are for an average-sized Crown Base made from a ring of 7 Archaic Men-o-War, however the modular design of the Crown Base allows them to be made in many different sizes. In practice, Crown Bases use anywhere from 5 to 15 Archaic Men-o-War, although even larger bases are theoretically possible. The overall commad base for the admiralty of the IEN, Lionheart, is said to be a Crown Base made up of 15 Archaic Men-o-War. Since every detail regarding Lionheart is a closely-guarded secret (especially its current location), this size is nothing more than conjecture, and it is quite possible that Lionheart is even larger. It has even been suggested that Lionheart is not a ring of Archaic Men-o-War at all, and is actually a ring of Armadas! In almost all cases, a Crown Base will be 65 tons per Archaic Man-o-War used in its construction (this represents 50 tons for the Man-o-War, plus 15 tons of citadel components), with corresponding hull points and weaponry (ie. 1 heavy ballista, 2 medium ballistas, and 1 medium catapult per ship). In some cases extra citadel components will be used, however this is rare.